| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Heart of the West by O. Henry: days when his problems were only those of wind and wool and water.
A thing had happened to the man--a thing that, if you are eligible,
you must pray may pass you by. He had become enveloped in the Indian
Summer of the Soul.
Dry Valley had had no youth. Even his childhood had been one of
dignity and seriousness. At six he had viewed the frivolous gambols of
the lambs on his father's ranch with silent disapproval. His life as a
young man had been wasted. The divine fires and impulses, the glorious
exaltations and despairs, the glow and enchantment of youth had passed
above his head. Never a thrill of Romeo had he known; he was but a
melancholy Jaques of the forest with a ruder philosophy, lacking the
Heart of the West |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Several Works by Edgar Allan Poe: Perched, and sat, and nothing more.
Then the ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
"Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art sure no craven,
Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore--
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning--little relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door--
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from At the Sign of the Cat & Racket by Honore de Balzac: places in obedience to the laws of old-world orthography.
To quench the pride of those who believe that the world is growing
cleverer day by day, and that modern humbug surpasses everything, it
may be observed that these signs, of which the origin seems so
whimsical to many Paris merchants, are the dead pictures of once
living pictures by which our roguish ancestors contrived to tempt
customers into their houses. Thus the Spinning Sow, the Green Monkey,
and others, were animals in cages whose skills astonished the passer-
by, and whose accomplishments prove the patience of the fifteenth-
century artisan. Such curiosities did more to enrich their fortunate
owners than the signs of "Providence," "Good-faith," Grace of God,"
|
